US Court Facebook can block any page without Court orders or explanations

US Court Facebook can block any page without Court orders or explanations
A US Federal Court has dismissed petition filed by Sikhs for Justice against Facebook for blocking former's page in India.

SFJ, a US based rights group, had filed the lawsuit against Facebook Inc. and claimed that the social media giant blocked its page at the behest of Indian government because of its outspoken campaign against government

Facebook allegedly did not restore access to the page despite repeated requests, nor did it provide any explanation for the page block.
SFJ sought a permanent injunction ordering Facebook to stop restricting access, and any documents or correspondence with the Indian government related to a request that Facebook block its page.

SFJ lawsuit requested the court to issue an order compelling Facebook to produce all its communication with government of India related to SFJ’s page and to issue an order reinstating access and enjoining Facebook from blocking SFJ’s online content in future.

In November 13 ruling, US Northern District of California, San Jose division, District Judge Lucy Koh stated that Sikh groups claims of religious discrimination are precluded under the Communications Decency Act, which protects providers of "interactive computer services" by barring courts from treating service providers like Facebook as the publishers or speakers of speech created by others.

Judge Koh dismissed the discrimination claim, citing 47 USC 230 (Section 230), a federal law enacted in 1996. Section 230 has two key provisions. 230(c)(1) says that websites aren’t liable for third party content. Section 230(c)(2) says websites aren’t liable for their filtering decisions. The judge relied exclusively on Section 230(c)(1), explaining that the content at issue (the SFJ page) was provided by someone other than Facebook (i.e., SFJ), and the only allegedly “discriminatory” behavior was Facebook’s decision not to publish SFJ’s content. The court also rejected SFJ’s argument that Facebook owed it an explanation.

 


Attorney Gurpatwant Singh Pannun, legal adviser to SFJ told to media following,
"We will appeal and challenge the decision of Judge Koh which is just an extension of Facebook action of blocking SFJ's page at the behest of the Indian government,"

"If Facebook is a public company making billions of dollars in public money and they don't want to give any explanation for why they blocked the content of a human rights group, then what is the difference between a democracy and a dictatorship?"

"Facebook owes an explanation to its users after or before blocking and removing the content which is guaranteed under freedom of speech,"

After this order from now Facebook will block all the pages requested by states or governments or corporations without giving any explanation to Facebook page owners.


Today its Facebook SFJ, tomorrow it can be Greenpeace

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Thursday, November 19, 2015

Tags – Facebook Block Page No Court Orders Required